Tick-tock, tick-tock. The striking hours of your death clock.
It was half-past nine. Two and a half hours until she was free.
Raven bit her lip so hard that a ruby-red drop of blood trickled down her chin. Shouldn't this be over? Her last birthday had been devastating enough—surely no one could hurt her more than they already had. Surely no one could tear her heart into smaller pieces than it was already. Surely she couldn't be any closer to complete, total isolation.
Surely, surely, surely...
She curled into the farthest corner of her room. The lights flickered unevenly as pain clawed its way up her throat, as sharp as thorns and twice as painful. The whirlwind inside of her mind caused a few shaded lamps to sputter. Raven dug her nails into her palm. Stay calm, she ordered herself. You're not weak. You can get through this. Just like you did last year.
Another lamp fizzled out. Raven concentrated until sweat poured down her cheeks and she could feel the strain of it shaking her limbs. Her lips formed the soundless words that caused her so much pain and power. And then the silent rush of blankness swept everything into a little pile, and then pushed it into oblivion. Nothingness reined again. Just like it always had. And just how it always should, Raven berated herself. She couldn't put her only allies in the world through the hell that had been her last birthday.
Control. That was the secret—the only thing that kept her from cracking. Control. Control over everything. Even the façade of control when things were screamingly out of her power helped, at least a little. And now she was back in the seat of power, commanding every thought and every movement and every absence of feeling.
It didn't stop the hot tears from spilling down her cheeks, though. And as warm as the tears were, they didn't—they couldn't—thaw her frozen heart.
She stayed in the corner for nearly an hour, staring across her room. She wondered what she was feeling. She had trained herself to be made of ice—but even so, there had always been the familiar, tickling ping at the back of her brain…until now. It had been the ping that went through her when she knew she should be feeling something. Feeling…emotion. It told her about all these things that she couldn't experience herself. It showed her about smiling when there was a joke. Frowning when there was a mistake. And most of all—the most vibrant ping she had ever seen—was the one for the expressions that flashed across Starfire's face as quickly as a comet, glimmering enticingly in the dark velvet sky. Raven envied that. She envied how Starfire found everything so…Easy. She laughed. She frowned. She smiled when Robin kissed the tip of her nose or brushed her arm.
That was another thing Raven could add to her list—the way Starfire and Robin found it so easy to love. She couldn't imagine anything so intimate…Letting someone sit so close to you that your two heartbeats were one. Leaning in to caress someone's lips with your own. Twining your fingers together as you strolled across the room. Letting everyone in the world know that you loved and you were loved.
Raven imagined herself sitting in a chair as some faceless lover stared into her eyes, and let her know that she was the one. The one that completed his life. The one that he couldn't live without, whose soul was joined to his in everlasting love. He'd place a careful, chaste kiss upon her brow and tangle his fingers with hers, only it wouldn't be awkward, because this was a dream. And then he swept her away to some vast, remote, frozen tundra, and they'd rule forever and ever…
…actually, forever and never. Raven watched, helpless in her own imagination, as her face blurred. Her dark eyes brightened into a perfect green. Her short, blunt hair lengthened and grew improbably glossy, as well as shining with coppery light. Her chalky skin bronzed and her limbs grew longer, leaner. The faceless lover wasn't faceless anymore—he had short, dark, mussed hair and an intense gaze. There was pain in his eyes and a story in his heart that he couldn't trust anyone with. He murmured soft words to the not-Raven that tumbled together into a torrent of something real-Raven could never, never have. And when they kissed, it was far from chaste. It was the all-consuming love where Raven supposed you never got enough of the one you cared about. And what hurt the most was that they were beautiful together. They had been beautiful before, on their own…But as they joined, a radiant glow spread throughout their bodies until they were made of light—consumed by light, until it glared into Raven's eyes and she couldn't see them, even as her heart ached to. And then suddenly, in a tantalizing sparkle, they were gone. All that remained was a joyful laugh on a breeze that didn't exist, and a single fiery red hair shining in the illusion of sunlight.
It was the lamest fantasy yet, because all it did was make Raven even more jealous of Starfire and Raven as she had been before.
She knew they shared something so deep that she couldn't begin to understand it…And she knew that the acid of their love was burning her up from the inside. She knew the envious flame was smoldering inside of her right now. It made her realize how lonely she was. It made her realize that she longed for warmth beside her, for lips tickling her ear as they whispered softly to her. She suddenly saw how exposed she was.
Didn't standing alone give you strength? Shouldn't it make things easier? There was no one you cared for—no one for Slade to torture. The only way you could be hurt was if someone hurt you. You had no ties to anything. You could live anywhere, move as quickly as light on water and stay as fleetingly as a firefly's glow.
It should have given her strength. But all Raven felt was isolation.
Her clock chimed softly. Raven checked the smooth arrows. Eleven o' clock. One more hour. One more freaking hour.
And then the door opened.
Raven was on her feet in an instant, instantly feeling the familiar, icy power run through her hands. A black nimbus was already crackling around her fingers when she realized it was just Robin.
She sank back onto her haunches, breathing raggedly. Robin's eyebrows rose, but he sat on her bed anyway. Despite everything, Raven couldn't help but admire his lean muscles, the way he walked lightly on his toes. She saw his sad, tired eyes, and felt a little quiver of regret pass through her. He didn't have to be like this. He could have asked her for help.
Robin looked sideways at the small clock she clutched with white fingers. "I thought you'd be here," he said in that soft-as-ash voice.
Raven tried to smile weakly. "It's that time of year again," she quipped, but the joke was feeble. As feeble as her life.
"You don't have to stay locked up in here, you know. Beast Boy would have been happy to cook a celebratory dinner." Robin patted the bed by his side. Raven hovered by the wall reluctantly for a moment, then joined him on the bare mattress. She had ripped off the blankets during her nightmares a few hours ago and never got around the replacing them.
Raven sighed. "It's…easier. I don't want everyone all jumpy just because of me and my issues. They're nervous enough, with Slade back in town."
His eyes flashed in mild frustration. "We're your friends, Raven. We care about you."
"Yeah, well…" Raven trailed off. She glanced automatically at the smooth clock face. Five after.
Robin noticed the clock. He took it from her unwilling hands and frowned at it. "I thought the prophecy was for last year," he said. Raven's fingers drummed anxiously by her side until he cradled them around the clock again. She couldn't suppress a shiver when he brushed the underside of her wrist for a moment.
"There's no reason not to be careful," she muttered. Her ghostly white legs almost glowed in the twilight of her room.
Robin looked at her. There was pity in his expression when he looked into her indigo eyes—as wild and untamed as the cold, churning sea, and just as easy to succumb to. They were eyes you could drown in. They were ice that could freeze you into submittance. Raven met his gaze for a moment, then dropped it. "Don't feel sorry for me," she said roughly. "Don't you freaking feel sorry for me."
"I don't feel sorry for you," he whispered, but there was sadness in his voice. And before she knew it, his fingers had twined with hers.
Raven jumped, startled. She yanked her hand out his grasp, heart thumping. She was afraid—but afraid of how she had reacted. She hadn't expected the sudden flash of longing. She hadn't expected the desire twisting in her belly.
And she certainly hadn't expected herself to slowly, ever so slowly, trace Robin's jaw with careful fingertips. Raven pushed all of the misgivings aside so that maybe, just this once, she could enjoy herself. But even as she looked into Robin's leavening eyes and felt a shimmer of yearning in her, she knew that sooner or later the guilt would have to come crashing down. It always did.